The airship that we travelled on was a marvel, something that almost took my breath away in wonder when I first laid my eyes on it. It looked like a floating, lacquered wooden or ceramic ship, but its size dwarfed even the largest cruise liners of my last life while being completely covered in glyphs of various sizes. It hummed with power in my magical senses as it hovered leisurely and confidently near the Imperial capital of Qian while passengers were ferried on and off.
It was run by an "Immortal family", which was generally considered smaller and more tightly knit than a "clan" like Xiao Li's. They were roamers, rarely returning to the places they had been to in the past, as they were open about the fact that most of them cultivated methods that emphasised the need to travel and/or trade. It made me shake my head, realising that what Mrs Mei had said was likely accurate, that there were innumerable Daos to follow, with them all allegedly leading to the same place: longevity—I think it might even be possible for someone like Eminem to actually become a Rap God here.
I assumed that some family members travelled far ahead to the places it was likely to visit or they had some way to communicate over a long distance, like Sending, or probably both. Otherwise, it would be a bit difficult to plan their business while at the same time not often revisiting former locations. Did that mean that there were many of these types of groups? Xiao Li implied that airships were pretty common, enough that we'd probably be able to get one going in our direction in only a few months. However, perhaps some people ran scheduled air service, too, and not just this type of one-off system.
It might seem likely that due to the price of a ticket, all passengers would be cultivators, and while most were, I also saw a lot of cultivators with mortal family members and the like as well. For one ticket, you could stay on the airship for a year, so we were quite overpaying since we only needed to stay a week and a half to get to our destination.
I think most of the singleton cultivators were similar. However, I imagined if your destination wasn't a specific location so much as far away from where you started, then it might seem cheap to get on and wait the whole year before getting off. I bet these sorts of exile passengers didn't start scouting locations to get off for at least nine months.
I was shocked to notice that several such families got on the ship when we did, escorted by the dour-faced Imperial guard. Not all the grass got pulled up here in the Qian, I suppose, but close to a year of travel on this airship that very rarely double-backed might be as good as being in another realm or dead.
Even if they had a grudge, could they even find the Qian empire when they got stronger? It wasn't like that it was uniquely named. Qian literally meant money, so it was a popular surname, and I imagined a prevalent name for nations founded by those people with such surnames.
Also, I imagined that most of these people were just caught on the periphery and wouldn't have huge resentments, aside from being exiled. I carefully eavesdropped and didn't notice anyone from the Chancellor's family, for example. I bet these were some of his nominal allies who just went along with him for the sake of politics.
In any case, they saw both Xiao Li and me get on at the same time, and one and all, they studiously tried to avoid us. They saw us not escorted by the Imperial guard, and even if they didn't figure us agents of the state sent to make sure they didn't jump off at the next stop, we were still reminders of a life they'd never return to.
The family that ran the ship provided food and shops on board, but unlike a cruise liner that it resembled, the ship was not all-inclusive. The food was cheap for the most part, though. However, the shops were not. At least, not usually. Some things seemed reasonable, but a lot did not.
I bought several more books on beginner talismans, including over a hundred new talismans for the Qi Gathering stage, but when I looked at the price for a beginner book on formations, I baulked. They wanted twenty-five mid-grade spirit stones, which was a fortune that someone on my level didn't usually have.
It was true that most people didn't study formations until the Foundation Establishment, but that was mainly a function of them not being able to understand the complicated magical system and circuitry involved. I was positive I could. Moreover, there were beginner-level formations that would be suitable for my level, and this book detailed about a dozen of them in good detail.
I finally shook my head. I wanted to buy it, but they admitted that the book was fairly widely distributed. Xiao Li seemed to think that both of us would get into the Silver Serenities Sword School fairly easily, and if so, I am sure that the school had such tomes available to be borrowed or purchased by their students for a much smaller price, as it was in their benefit to nurture talents.
The area we were headed to was much more advanced from a cultivation perspective than the Qian empire. It was almost as though I was leaving the tutorial zone in a game, I thought wryly.
The ship didn't head directly to Cloudsoar City, where the Sect was located. If it had, it could have made the trip in only a couple of days. It made several brief stops in seemingly random directions, even a dizzying jaunt at its maximum speed out to one of the huge lakes that made the Great Lakes look like my childhood swimming hole.
The day the ship was supposed to approach Cloudsoar City, both Xiao Li and I were out on the deck watching the city seem to approach. We weren't the only ones, either, as this might be the largest city they'd see in a whole year of travel.
I thought that I wouldn't be as shocked as I had when I saw the ship I was standing on, but watching the city get larger in the distance, I realised I was wrong. It was large. Enormous and gigantic would also be a word. I had seen the largest cities in the world back on Earth, as I flew quite often and it wasn't uncommon to connect in large cities like New York or Chicago. I had even seen Mexico City from the air. This dwarfed all of those.
I asked what our altitude was, and one of the ship's company glanced over the side and estimated it at roughly fifty to sixty li. My eyes boggled as I hadn't entirely realised what scale we were operating on. My vision had gotten a lot better, so it didn't appear as though we were so high. Back on Earth, this would have made me an astronaut, or at least close to it, yet we could breathe with no problems.
I wondered at what altitude would the air appreciably thin, and at what altitude could a curvature be detected—assuming we weren't on a flat earth type of situation, which actually seemed more likely.
And even at this altitude, I couldn't see the far edge of the city. Part of that was because there was a huge plateau in the middle of the city that partially blocked the far end of the city, but the city continued around it, and I couldn't quite make out the far ends on the edges, which were unobscured, either.
It was easily at least one and a half orders of magnitude larger than the capital of the Qian Dynasty, and it had been a large city by Earth's standards.
I let out a breath in a long exhale and smiled. This was so far outside my expectations that it was like seeing an alien planet for the first time.
The massive airship descended down to and slowed to a halt a bit away from the city, along the highway. It pulled in neatly next to about a dozen other large airships, each of them appearing different enough that it was clear that none of them were of a class.
As to why they weren't pulling directly next to the city, I got my answer when a member of the ship's complement starte yelling reminders, "To our guests departing, we remind you that it is against the law to fly in Cloudsoar City."
Ah, that made a bit of sense. Cultivators could fly with treasures when they reached the Foundation Establishment, and sometimes earlier than that if they had special constitutions or abilities. It would be a bit hectic if there were no rules about restricted airspace, to say nothing of the loss of life that would be caused if a ship as big as the Moment of Contemplation that we were standing on fell onto part of the city.
We were still several thousand metres above the ground, high enough that we would have needed supplemental oxygen if this world was Earth and ran on the physics that I understood about gas fluid dynamics.
The crew was getting ready to ferry people down to the ground, but I nudged Xiao Li and said, "I have a spell called Featherfall. Want to try it?"
His eyes lit up, and he grinned. That was enough, and I cast the spell. We timed our leaps together and then took a long running jump off the gunwale. A number of people saw us, and few gasped, mainly some mortals and low-level cultivators. The ship people didn't seem to mind. From their perspective, whether we lived or died—it was just two fewer people to ferry to the ground. We had already paid, after all.
I had upcasted it to the second level, which would give us five minutes of the transmutation because I figured we were high enough that our freefall would be over the standard duration. Durations with spells weren't exact, anyway, like in the tabletop game. It would be one minute-ish. Usually plus or minus ten per cent.
I'd be able to recast Featherfall on myself if we suddenly found ourselves in freefall after floating half the way down, but there was no guarantee I'd be able to get Xiao Li on the casting too if he had drifted too far away, and I'd rather not kill my best friend.
Although I had bought a couple of diamonds for emergencies, I don't think he'd be all that chipper about the oversight even if I could revivify him. Even if I had to admit, it might be hilarious.
As we cleared the gunwale and started floating down with nothing in between us and the earth so far below, Xiao Li yelled, "Wocao! Holy shit!"
I laughed as I felt the rushing wind on my face while Crow was yowling pitifully in his little carrier on my back. This was a lot like freefalling with a parachute. If I were by myself, I would consider leaping off without casting it and trying to do a HALO, but that would be reckless unless we could ensure we were both close together for the entire freefall.
The floating down was longer than I remembered from parachuting, but only a couple of minutes before our feet gently touched the ground, not too far from the large group of buildings and tents that I thought must be used as a cargo transhipment area for this airship aerodrome.
Xiao Li turned around, grabbed me by the shoulders, and shook me, grinning widely, yelling, "That. Was. AWESOME!"
"Don't shake me to death!" I complained, and he coughed and let go, but I grinned too. I had parachuted in the past, not in the Navy, of course. I was a glorified mechanic, not a SEAL, but where there were military bases, there was always civilian skydiving around.
I remember the first time I did so was right after finishing the Navy's Nuclear Field "A" School. I had gone with a buddy to Charleston, and we had skydived to celebrate before going to Power School.
We had to jump tandem with an instructor, and I remember, for some reason, my buddy's instructor was a busty redhead while I got to be the little spoon to a six-foot-three Peurto Rican amateur bodybuilder. Talk about injustice. Still, no matter how scared I was, I refused to call him Papi on the freefall down!
"Alright, let's go," I told him, and we ran off at my max speed, which was really quite fast now, especially now that I had reached some attainment on the footwork technique that I had practised.
Once we got to the immense city, we waited. Although we often got to cut in lines in the past, now we were back to being nobodies. Perhaps they would have let us cut if we were both in the Foundation establishment realm, though.
Even so, the line moved quite quickly, and it was only a couple of hours before we were standing in front of a giant portcullis. There were many guards here, and the entire wall itself thrummed with power. The guard in charge didn't even ask us any questions, but he did glance down in a way that I suspected meant we were being examined by some kind of automated system. Finally, he said, "Entry fee is two hundred and fifty taels of gold each."
I gaped. That was a huge amount. Usually, it was just a couple of taels of silver in small cities. I didn't even know if I had that much, so I fished out a low-grade spirit stone and asked, "Can you make change?" I wasn't sure because there often wasn't any real exchange rate between the two currencies.
He nodded as if this was a common request. It must be because he just reached down and grabbed a bag of gold and tossed it at me after taking the spirit stone. I doubted very much I was getting a good exchange rate just judging on the feel of the weight of the metal in the sack, but at least I had a little change.
"Uh, Wen... I don't know if I have enough gold on me, either," Xiao Li said.
I chuckled, "I didn't think I would ever say this in my life, but what's eight or nine kilos of gold between friends, eh?" I tossed him the sack, and he fished out the gold quickly. The guard looked a little put out, and I suspected that his usurious money changing might be a personal side gig instead of something arranged by the city itself. Clever.
After Xiao Li paid, we were both handed a small, blue embossed book and ushered through quickly. There were multiple lines, like a modern customs checkpoint, but they aimed to keep the line outside moving quickly, and they did.
Before we proceeded any further, we found a place to sit briefly and glanced at the book we were given. Three characters were painted in intriguing dark violet ink, "Cloud", "Soar" and "City." Flipping through it, it appeared to be a guide to new people.
I raised an eyebrow. Cloudsoar City was approximately four hundred thirty kilometres in diameter and was separated into two main sections. The "lower city" was created at ground level surrounding the plateau, and the "upper city" which was on top of the flat area of the plateau. The plateau itself was over ten kilometres tall, which was easily higher than Mt Everest on Earth, which was utterly ridiculous.
The name of the city was due to the fact that high-level clouds would often blanket the upper city as though it were fog. Not surprisingly, the upper city was the nicest part of the city, and any fighting there was prohibited. The same wasn't true in the lower city. Although fighting on the streets was banned, fighting inside various villas, buildings, and properties was not. This obviously made the lower city much more lively.
I finished reading a portion and frowned, shocked, "Wait, the city is a democracy?" Such things existed?
Xiao Li must have already read ahead of me because he made a waffling gesture, "I'm not sure if that word really applies..." He giggled, "You're still not eligible to vote, you see? I am, though. Don't worry, Wen, I will look out for your interests!"
I nodded and continued reading. It was a system of restricted voting, like the Roman Republic, and it also had features of plural voting. Taken together, it probably wouldn't meet the definitions of even "democracy-ish" back home.
However, it wasn't my sex that prevented me from voting but my cultivation level. Regular people could not vote, and you only got a vote when you reached the fifth level of the Qi Gathering realm. Then, you got ten votes when you reached the Foundation Establishment and a hundred when you reached Core Formation.
It didn't mention Nascent Soul cultivators at all, and we both knew there were a number of such powerhouses here, so I suspected they just considered it insulting to be offered a thousand votes. If such people were interested in the secular running of the city, I had no doubt that they had a ton of influence in Guanxi networks across the city, anyway.
I grinned, "Ah, you're wrong! See? I get one vote, as I would definitely meet the basic qualification of a low-level master talisman artist. You get more votes for any skilled professions you have." I could create talismans for the sixth grade, two higher grades than my actual cultivation. Making sixth-grade talismans was the basic cut-off for a basic mastery.
Xiao Li pouted, "I still have more than you since I'm an alchemist, too, then."
"Yes, yes," I allowed gracefully, "Do you have an idea of where we should stay until the twelfth lunar month?" Sects generally opened admissions once per year, he told me, and we still had several months until then.
He shrugged, "Not really."
"There is no local branch of the Hidden Flowers Fairyland in this city, but Fei Fei recommended I take her token to a place called the Carefree Grotto. She'd say they'd offer free advice, anyway," I suggested.
He raised an eyebrow but nodded, so we headed off.
With as large of a city, transportation was a non-trivial problem. There was actually a legitimate magical train system, similar to the lightning rails in the Eberron setting, although I wasn't sure what powered them. The streets were very wide and segregated into different colour-coded lanes, with the other side of the street mirrored, except the direction of travel was opposite—just like a highway on Earth.
Regular people could only walk or use carriages on the far right lane, Qi Gathering cultivators in the middle lane, and Foundation Establishment in the left lane. This was mainly so that each lane could move at its fastest speed.
This did work very well but ended up in situations where regular people could only make right turns and could only cross the street at special overhead bridges that were spaced every half kilometre or so; otherwise, they'd be taking their lives into their own hands. A situation like where the speedster character A-Train disintegrated a woman by running through her on the TV show The Boys was a real concern, although generally, cultivators could usually avoid mortals if they really tried, even if they were running flat out.
According to the booklet, Core Formation cultivators were allowed to fly, so they didn't need to bother with this.
I was curious about the train, especially when I saw that it was how you got to the upper city, but we decided to just run after getting directions on where the Carefree Grotto was. I could easily run a hundred kilometres an hour now, which was well into the low-level speedster realm if I were a superhero. It also was way faster than all but the most powerful physical classes could move back into Merildwen's old world.
After we arrived, we were greeted by an enchantingly beautiful fox girl, complete with red hair, a bushy red tail and fox ears on her head. I wanted to pet those ears but was shocked. What was going on? Was this an anime, after all? But then I realised that she was actually a transformed monster.
Animals could be categorised into several categories, with regular animals that I would recognise at the very bottom and monsters at the top. As regular animals got more Qi, they would turn into so-called demonic beasts, the kind that me and Xiao Li tended to eat. Although these beasts had the strength of a cultivator, they didn't actually cultivate. They were just really strong and occasionally had fey abilities like the ability to shoot lightning out of their butt like the thunderfowl.
However, when a demonic beast opened their spirituality and started to cultivate, they were reclassified as "diremonsters." At this point, they gained an intellect at least comparable to the average human, and when a Diremonster reached the Foundation Establishment realm, they could transform into a human shape. However, some monsters could transform even before that, like the fox girl in front of us. Foxes were known for their ability to transform, so they could do it a little bit before everyone else.
I wasn't sure about the cultural taboos, but I decided never to eat meat from Diremonsters, even if they couldn't transform. That was the point that they'd have a similar intellect to a human, so it kind of felt a little bit like cannibalism to do so, even if I suspected that nobody else around, even Xiao Li or the Diremonsters themselves, would think so.
Back where we were from, not only were there not many Diremonsters but they'd never be allowed inside human cities! Even I was questioned pretty thoroughly at first after I stopped using Disguise Self religiously, with many people thinking I might be a Diremonster—paradoxically, my low cultivation helped convince most people as they didn't think a low-level monster could transform.
Also, there were plenty of unique constitutions and even cultivation methods that tended to alter the way you looked, which was why I decided to stop using illusion to hide myself in the first place. There were enough weird-looking people that I was just one more in a crowd.
In this city, diremonsters were just one more type of citizen, and they could even vote, although only those who could transform would generally come inside the city limits unescorted.
The fox-girl took us into a small room and seemed to be pleased to offer us newcomers advice about where to go, what to do and the like after seeing Fei Fei's jade token.
She spent a fair bit of time talking to us about our options, and when we had finally settled on a place to rent a villa, she took me aside, produced a small booklet about the size of a manga, took my hand and placed the book in it and nodded at me, saying, "This is from us, sister. Remember, you're always welcome!"
I blinked but nodded and left the grotto. In my hands, the book was labelled "Two Hundred Skills of the Tenaciously Surviving Monster Spirit." Wait, did the foxgirl think I was a diremonster, too?!
"Tsk," I said and looked down at the book. Xiao Li blinked and asked, "What'd she give you?"
Still, two hundred skills that only monsters passed down to each other in secret?! This should be awesome and powerful! I suddenly didn't care that the foxgirl thought I was a monster, too. In fact, didn't I just say that the reason I wouldn't eat diremonsters was I thought they were no different from me? I nodded. Thank you for the powerful skills, senior Monster!
I hid the book away in my hammerspace and said, "Nothing for you." These were the secret techniques of us monsters, after all!
We had to run a fair distance to get to the company that managed short-term villas that were recommended by the foxgirl, but the process for renting one was simple.
After we got settled, Xiao Li ran off to get some meat from a market for us to eat dinner, and I pulled out the book of secret techniques and grinned in anticipation.
Would I be able to cultivate these techniques, or did they require monster qi? I frowned, flipping through to the first page, Sacred Stealing Technique.
I blinked, reading it. Wasn't this just normal thievery and pickpocketing?!
The next skill was "How To Successfully Form A Team To Rob A Human Cultivator."
Ultimate Begging Technique?!
Five Hundred Ways to Make a Human Cultivator Surrender Without Fighting?!
I flipped through it, growing more and more disturbed. Towards the back of the book were two ultimate techniques, "Unique Skill of Charming and Seduction for Beautiful Female Monsters" and "How To Win The Mistress' Heart For the Male Monster."
The last technique in the book was simply called "Surrender."
I angrily threw the book across the room.